With the 2012 gaming calendar all but wrapped, there’s only one thing left to do – celebrate the year’s best titles spanning a variety of genres. However, PSU.com has this year decided to inject a little twist into the proceedings. Instead of deciding on things ourselves, we’ve given you, the PSU community, the keys to the castle so to speak, with the list of nominees and ultimate winners decided entirely by our loyal readers. Whether it’s Sports, RPG or Action/Adventure, you guys have been voting manically for the past seven days or so, deciding the cream of the crop among 2012’s gaming greats. Simply put, this is YOUR Game of the Year Awards.
So, without further ado, let’s crack on with our look at the Best Racing Game of 2012, as decided by you lovely chaps and chapettes.
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Speed freaks weren’t particularly well-catered for in 2012 with only a few racing games hailed as a success by the critics. Among the best of the bunch were DIRT Showdown, Sonic & All-Stars Racing and LittleBigPlanet Karting on PlayStation 3, and the brilliant Motorstorm RC on PlayStation Vita. There were also a few familiar franchises that made a comeback this year with relative degrees of success, including WipeOut 2048, Ridge Racer Unbounded and WRC 3. And it’s one of the well-known IPs that the readers of PlayStation Universe have voted their favourite racing game of 2012.
And the winner is…
Need For Speed: Most Wanted
EA’s rejuvenated racer slaughtered the opposition by gaining around 90 percent of the votes from PSU readers. Not only does Most Wanted deliver a great roster of cars that handle superbly on the twisting roads of Fairhaven City, but it brings a whole new social and competitive aspect to racing games that we haven’t seen before. The fact that everything you and others do is tracked so meticulously gives you real reason to keep on playing so you can shave seconds off your best times or try and beat what your friends have achieved. Most importantly, it’s the driving and the intensity of burning down highways at break-neck speed weaving in and out of traffic that wins you over.
Read a snippet of our Need For Speed Most Wanted review below:
“It’s clear the developer held onto much of its experience with Burnout: Paradise and built upon the NFS franchise after some less than perfect recent outings. Most Wanted certainly doesn’t reinvent the arcade-style racing game, nor does it perfect it. However, this is one of the most complete arcade racers we’ve seen and certainly one of the franchise’s best.”